Scharinger Christian, Prislan Laura, Bernecker Katharina, Ninaus Manuel
Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien Tübingen, Germany.
Department of Teaching and Learning with Intelligent Systems (LLiS), University of Stuttgart, Germany.
Biol Psychol. 2023 Apr;179:108545. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108545. Epub 2023 Mar 23.
Gamification of cognitive tasks might positively affect emotional-motivational factors (emotional design perspective) or negatively affect cognitive factors like working memory load (minimalistic design perspective). The current study examined the effects of gamification in a spatial n-back working memory task on task performance, task load (i.e., working memory load and effort), and subjective task experience. Task load was assessed by the physiological process measures pupil dilation and EEG theta (4-6 Hz) and alpha (8-13 Hz) frequency band power. Gamification was achieved by elements of emotional design (i.e., the visual screen design using, e.g., color, cartoon figures as n-back stimuli, and a narrative embedding of the task). While EEG and eye-tracking were recorded, participants conducted gamified and non-gamified 1-back and 2-back load levels. The gamification resulted in positive effects on subjective task experience and affect. Despite these effects, gamification did not affect task performance and task load. However, exploratory analyses revealed increased EEG theta power at right-parietal electrodes for gamified task versions compared to non-gamified ones. Potentially, this effect might indicate participants' increased effort or concentration in the gamified n-back task. In line with an emotional design perspective, gamification positively altered subjective task experience and affect without hampering task performance and therefore justify the extra effort of implementing game elements.
认知任务的游戏化可能会对情绪动机因素产生积极影响（从情感设计角度来看），或者对诸如工作记忆负荷等认知因素产生消极影响（从简约设计角度来看）。本研究考察了在空间n-back工作记忆任务中游戏化对任务表现、任务负荷（即工作记忆负荷和努力程度）以及主观任务体验的影响。任务负荷通过生理过程指标瞳孔扩张以及脑电图θ波（4 - 6赫兹）和α波（8 - 13赫兹）频段功率来评估。游戏化是通过情感设计元素实现的（即视觉屏幕设计，例如使用颜色、卡通人物作为n-back刺激，以及任务的叙事嵌入）。在记录脑电图和眼动追踪的同时，参与者进行了游戏化和非游戏化的1-back和2-back负荷水平任务。游戏化对主观任务体验和情感产生了积极影响。尽管有这些影响，游戏化并未影响任务表现和任务负荷。然而，探索性分析显示，与非游戏化版本相比，游戏化任务版本在右侧顶叶电极处的脑电图θ波功率增加。这一效应可能表明参与者在游戏化的n-back任务中付出了更多努力或更加专注。从情感设计角度来看，游戏化积极地改变了主观任务体验和情感，同时又不妨碍任务表现，因此证明了实施游戏元素所付出的额外努力是合理的。
